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Mississippi man sent to death row by faulty forensics to get another day in court
Posted: August 2, 2007 12:38 pm
Kennedy Brewer was sentenced to death in Mississippi of the 1991 murder of a 3-year-old girl. His conviction was based largely on the testimony of Dr. Michael West, forensic dentist who claimed that multiple abrasions on the child's partially decomposed body matched the upper bite of Brewer. The incorrect matching of bitemarks has been a cause of at least four wrongful convictions later overturned by DNA evidence, and West’s unorthodox methods have been debunked by many experts and he has been expelled from several professional associations.
DNA testing in 2002 excluded Kennedy Brewer as the source of the semen recovered from the child. Even though the court threw out the conviction and death sentence based on the new DNA evidence, the local prosecutor announced he would re-try Mr. Brewer and use Michael West again as a bite mark expert. The Innocence Project is co-counsel, along with Brewer's local counsel for the retrial.
In a Fox News article yesterday, Radley Balko writes about West’s questionable past and the unreliable nature of bitemark evidence.
Even in an already imprecise field, Dr. West has taken forensic odontology to bizarre, megalomaniacal depths. West claims to have invented a system he modestly calls "The West Phenomenon," in which he dons a pair of yellow goggles and, with the aid of a blue laser, says he can identify bite marks, scratches, and other marks on a corpse that no one else can see — not even other forensics experts.Read more about bite mark convictions later overturned by DNA evidence, and other unreliable forensic science that has contributed to wrongful convictions.
Conveniently, he claims his unique method can't be photographed or reproduced, which he says makes his opinions unimpeachable by other experts.
Read the full article here. (FoxNews.com, 08/01/07)
Tags: Kennedy Brewer, Bitemark Evidence
Mississippi man awaits a new trial after his release from death row
Posted: September 6, 2007 6:02 pm
Innocence Project client Kennedy Brewer has been on Mississippi’s death row for almost 15 years for the 1992 rape and murder of a young girl that DNA testing now shows he didn’t commit. Brewer was released from prison on bail on August 31 after DNA results showed he was not the source of evidence collected from the victim’s body. Prosecutors, however, have refused to compare the DNA from the crime scene to the state’s database and plan to retry Brewer for this crime. Innocence Project Co-Director Peter Neufeld tells the New York Times today that Brewer’s case illustrates a justice system slow to adapt to the hard science of DNA testing.
"The Brewer case illustrates that there are two Mississippi criminal justice systems,” Mr. Neufeld said. “There’s the old system that hasn’t changed at all and the new system that is trying to take the Bill of Rights seriously."
Modern forensic tools do not appear to carry much weight in Noxubee County. (Prosecutor Forrest) Allgood said DNA reversals — there have been more than 200 nationwide — did not prove innocence. Read the full story. (New York Times, 09/06/07)
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
DNA evidence clears two men in Mississippi and uncovers serious misconduct
Posted: February 8, 2008 4:25 pm
Innocence Project client Kennedy Brewer has waited more than 15 years – much of it on death row – for this day to come. DNA evidence proves that Brewer didn’t commit the heinous murder of a three-year-old girl for which he was sentenced to die in 1995, and he is expected to be exonerated at a hearing on Thursday (February 14).
The DNA evidence and other evidence uncovered by the Innocence Project and its partners also point to the identity of the real perpetrator of the murder, Justin Albert Johnson, who has confessed that he alone killed the little girl.
Johnson also confessed this week to killing another three-year-old girl in the same small Mississippi town eighteen months before the murder for which Brewer was convicted. The man convicted of this eerily similar crime, Levon Brooks, is also an Innocence Project client and is still in prison. The Innocence Project filed papers today seeking Brooks’ release. It’s possible that Brooks will also appear at Thursday’s hearing, where his conviction would be thrown out and he may be released.
These pending exonerations reveal startling misconduct in the Mississippi justice system, and the Innocence Project called for a review of the way evidence in the state is collected, analyzed and presented in court.
Read more in today’s Innocence Project press release.
Press coverage of Brewer’s and Brooks’ cases:
New York Times: New suspect is arrested in two Mississippi killings (02/08/08)
Associated Press: New suspect charged in 1982 Miss. Murder (02/08/08)
Picayune Item: Future unclear for death row inmate after another charged with crime (02/08/08)
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer, Government Misconduct, Death Penalty
Editorials in U.S. and Canada call for crime lab funding and forensic oversight
Posted: February 11, 2008 11:15 am
Newspaper editorials across the U.S. and Canada in recent days have called for government support of reliable forensic science and safeguards against questionable science leading to wrongful convictions.
The Detroit Free Press: “The U.S. Justice Department should be distributing, not stalling, money set aside to help analyze DNA evidence in cases where the findings might show that people were wrongly convicted of crimes.” Read the full editorial.
The Houston Chronicle: “You would think the last person Texas Department of Public Safety officials would want at the helm of the DNA division of the agency's McAllen crime lab would be a reject from its scandal-scarred Houston Police Department counterpart…” Read the full editorial.
From the Ontario (Canada) Daily Observer: “Dr. Charles Smith is an expert witness (supposedly) in forensic pathology who lied, invented, forgot, pretended, withheld, dismissed, neglected, guessed - and, as a result, sent many people to jail for crimes that never happened. Not to jail for murders they did not do, or for manslaughter cases in which they had no hand, but for murders and manslaughters that never occurred.” Read the full editorial.The Innocence Project has been at the center of activity in recent weeks aimed at improving the way forensic science is used in American courtrooms. Co-Director Peter Neufeld testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on the federal government’s failure to act on a law seeking to ensure crime lab oversight and fund DNA testing.
And this week Kennedy Brewer is expected to become the first person in Mississippi exonerated by DNA testing. He was sent to death row in 1995 based on seriously flawed forensic testimony. Read more.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Hearing set for Friday in Mississippi cases
Posted: February 12, 2008 11:40 am
Innocence Project client Kennedy Brewer will appear in a Mississippi courtroom on Friday as a judge considers whether to dismiss charges against him based on evidence of his innocence. Brewer spent 15 years behind bars – much of it on death row -- for the 1992 rape and murder of his girlfriend’s three-year-old daughter. Now DNA evidence proves his innocence and points to the identity of the real perpetrator, Justin Albert Johnson, who confessed to the crime. If charges are dropped Friday, Brewer will become the first person exonerated by post-conviction DNA testing in Mississippi.
The Innocence Project also represents Levon Brooks, who was convicted of an identical child murder that occurred in the same town 18 months earlier. Johnson has confessed to this murder as well. He was an initial suspect in both cases and lived near the victims at the time of the crimes. The Innocence Project is also seeking this week to expedite proceedings to vacate Brooks’ conviction as well, based on the evidence that Johnson committed the crime alone. Brooks’ case may be scheduled for the same hearing Friday.
Prosecutors in Mississippi have relied for years on the work of two discredited “experts” to examine forensic evidence and conduct autopsies. The Innocence Project has called for a review of forensic practices statewide. Read more in Friday’s Innocence Project press release.
Associated Press: Hearing on motion to exonerate man in child murder set for Friday (02/11/08)
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
NBC News tonight: DNA shakes up forensic science
Posted: February 13, 2008 11:08 am
Faulty bite mark comparison sent Kennedy Brewer to Mississippi’s death row for a murder he didn’t commit. Now DNA has proven his innocence, and the Innocence Project is asking a judge to drop all charges against him at a hearing set for Friday morning. Tonight on NBC Nightly News, reporter Robert Bazell covers DNA’s impact on forensic sciences used in the American criminal justice system. DNA exonerations have proven again and again that unreliable science can send innocent people to prison.
Now the Innocence Project and dozens of other organizations and experts are calling for a thorough review of forensic practices still in use. A report from the National Academy of Sciences on the topic is expected this summer.
Most forensic techniques “started because some officer had a case he had to solve, and they had to come up with some new angle on it,” Peter J. Neufeld, founder of the Innocence Project with his law partner Barry C. Scheck, told me. "So, they invented a technique. And those techniques, whether they're bite marks, or hair or fiber, never went through the kind of robust research that DNA was subjected to.”
Congress has asked the National Academy of Sciences to study the validity of current forensic techniques. The report, due out this summer, could shake up the field even more.
Read the full story here, and explore NBC’s interactive feature on the many facets of DNA testing.
Watch the report on NBC’s Nightly News with Brian Williams tonight.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Two Mississippi men are cleared after 15 years
Posted: February 15, 2008 3:20 pm
At hearings this morning in a packed Mississippi courthouse, two Innocence Project clients convicted of separate child murders in the same small Mississippi town were cleared based on new evidence proving their innocence. This day comes after nearly 15 years behind bars for Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer, who were joined in court this morning by more than 100 of their relatives.
Brewer, who served much of his time on death row, was fully exonerated today after all pending charges against him were dropped. He is the first person exonerated by post-conviction DNA testing in Mississippi and the 213th nationwide.
Brooks was released this morning after his conviction was vacated, and he will be fully exonerated when charges against him are dismissed, which we expect in the next few weeks.
Read today’s press release for more on these landmark cases.
Due to the gaps in forensic oversight revealed by these two cases, the Innocence Project has called for a top-to-bottom review of forensics in Mississippi. We have also called for an examination of the role of Steven Hayne, the widely discredited medical examiner who performed the autopsies in these two cases. Read the Innocence Project’s letter seeking the appointment of a State Medical Examiner.
Media coverage of Hayne’s role in the convictions of Brewer and Brooks:
Clarion-Ledger: Innocence Project letter blasts Steven Hayne's work
Reason Magazine Blog: President of Mississippi State Medical Association Denounces Dr. Hayne
Media Coverage of today’s releases:
Commerical Dispatch: Brewer goes free on 1992 child murder, rape charges
Clarion-Ledger: Brewer cleared of charges in child slaying
Jackson Free Press: Free at last
Hattiesburg American: DA’s having trouble keeping up with DNA
More Mississippi news:
Meanwhile, Mississippi legislators are considering a bill that would create a statewide task force on the handling of DNA evidence. A State Senate committee passed the bill earlier this week, citing Brwer and Brooks’ cases. Read more about that issue here. (Clarion-Ledger, 02/13/08)
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Mississippi lawmakers review evidence preservation in wake of Brewer and Brooks cases
Posted: February 19, 2008 4:21 pm
After Innocence Project clients Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks were cleared on Friday, Mississippi legislators began calling for reforms to the state’s criminal justice system. The Innocence Project has suggested that a law requiring that biological evidence be preserved could lead to more exonerations of innocent prisoners in Mississippi, and State Rep. Greg Snowden said the legislature should work toward an evidence preservation statute as soon as possible.
"There are people in prison who don't need to be there. Hopefully there are very few people like that. Particularly when the stakes are high, like if it is a death row sort of thing, obviously you want to do everything you can to make sure the right person is convicted," Snowden said.The Innocence Project has also called for a review of crime lab oversight mechanisms in Mississippi. Read more about these proposed reforms and the cases of Brewer and Brooks here.
Read the full story here. (ABC-11, Meridian, MS, 2/16/08)
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Fallout continues after Mississippi exoneration
Posted: February 20, 2008 11:05 am
Days after Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks were cleared in Mississippi, new questions are being raised about the forensic analysts and prosecutor who secured their convictions. Both men were wrongfully convicted of killing three-year-old girls in the early 1990s served 15 years behind bars before they were cleared. Brewer served several years on death row.
A discredited forensic dentist, Michael West, testified at both trials that marks on the victim’s bodies proved that Brooks and Brewer bit the victims – using only their top two teeth. In new statements published today by ABC News, Innocence Project Co-Director Peter Neufeld says that West’s actions in these cases was “criminal.”
West "deliberately fabricated evidence and conclusions which were not supported by the evidence, the data or the rules of science but … because they were consistent with the prosecutor's theory,'' said Peter Neufeld, co-director of the Innocence Project, a nonprofit legal organization that examines questionable convictions and has won the exoneration of more than 200 inmates.ABC News also spoke to Noxubee County Forrest Allgood, who brought West into the case as a witness. Allgood prosecuted both Brewer and Brooks in the 1990s, and he fought Brewer’s exoneration for the last seven years.
"If you fabricate evidence in a capital murder case, where you know that if the person's convicted they are going to be executed — as far as I'm concerned that's the crime of attempted murder.''
"He's a criminal," Neufeld said of West.
The two cases were investigated by the same Noxubee County, Mississippi detective and prosecuted by the same attorney, and the same medical examiner and forensic dentist appeared in each case.
This is the first time that Neufeld or his colleagues at the Innocence Project have ever called for the criminal prosecution of a scientist, Neufeld said.
"These are not cases of sloppy forensic science,'' Neufeld said on Monday. "This is intentional misconduct. It's fabricated evidence to send people to death row.''
Allgood said that during the trials of Brewer and Brooks in the early 1990s, West's reputation was intact.
"At the time he was sitting on top of the world,'' Allgood said. "He was lecturing in China. He was lecturing in England."
"Nobody wants to put the wrong guy in jail,'' Allgood concluded, though adding that he still believes that Brewer "had a hand'' in Jackson's abduction.In fact, West had already been widely discrdited – and his membership in professional associations had been revoked – when Allgood called him to testify in Brewer’s trial. There is also no evidence that Brewer “had a hand” in the kidnapping, rape or murder of the three-year-old victim; instead, there is solid, irrefutable scientific evidence that he was not involved in the crime at all.
Read the full story here. (ABC News, 02/20/08)
Read more about the Brewer and Brooks cases and reforms proposed by the Innocence Project to prevent future wrongful convictions in Mississippi.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Mississippi man gets new trial after 15 years in prison
Posted: February 25, 2008 4:32 pm
Arthur Johnson was expected to walk out of a Mississippi courthouse this afternoon after a state judge granted him a new trial due to DNA evidence showing that he didn’t commit a rape for which he has served more than 15 years in prison. Johnson, who is represented by Innocence Project New Orleans Director Emily Maw, was expected to be released on bond after meeting the $2,500 bail while a new trial is pending. His attorneys are asking prosecutors to drop the charges against him rather than seek a new trial.
Read the full story here. (Delta Democrat Times, 02/25/08)
If charges against Johnson are dropped, he would become the second person exonerated by DNA testing in Mississippi, after Kennedy Brewer became the first on Feb. 15.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Mississippi legislators pass DNA testing bill
Posted: February 28, 2008 4:10 pm
The Mississippi House of Representatives passed two bills this week providing DNA testing access to small groups of people convicted of – and charged with – murder. The bills would provide access to post-conviction DNA testing for people on death row, and would provide DNA testing access to people facing capital murder charges.
Mississippi is one of eight states in the U.S. with no state law allowing access to DNA testing. But the Innocence Project recommends that states allow testing in all cases in which DNA testing could change the conviction – not only death-penalty cases.
Earlier this month, the Mississippi Senate passed a bill addressing preservation of evidence in cases so that DNA testing can be done to determine guilt or innocence. That bill now moves to the House for consideration.
Read more about the bills here. (The Commercial Dispatch, 02/28/08)
The bills, which will now go to the Mississippi Senate, come in the wake of the Feb. 15 exoneration of Kennedy Brewer and the release of Levon Brooks, both of whom spent 15 years behind bars for crimes they didn’t commit. Read more about their cases here.
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer, Evidence Preservation, Access to DNA Testing
Mississippi cases continue to draw national attention
Posted: February 29, 2008 4:10 pm
Questionable forensic practices in Mississippi have remained in the national news in the wake of the hearings earlier this month clearing two men after they served 15 years for separate murders they didn’t commit. The exoneration of Kennedy Brewer and release of Levon Brooks on Feb. 15 has led to serious questions about the work of medical examiner Steven Hayne and forensic dentist Michael West, and the Innocence Project has been joined by several other organizations in calling for forensic reform in Mississippi. Here are excerpts from an Associated Press article running around the country today:
The turn of events has shocked the community, especially the victims' families, and led to accusations that West deliberately falsified evidence.
"You have people who engaged in misconduct and manufactured evidence and we've proved it," said Peter Neufeld, co-director of the Innocence Project, which has won the exoneration of more than 200 inmates nationwide and assembled the expert panel that examined the Brewer case. "These two cases are going to be an eye-opener for the people of Mississippi about some of the problems they have in criminal justice and how easy it will be to make it right."
…
Brewer, who was released on bail last year, a few years after DNA tests excluded him as the rapist, was finally exonerated by a judge on Feb. 15.
"I ain't worried about the past. I'm thinking about the future," Brewer said. But he offered some advice to prosecutors: "They need to get the truth before they lock up the wrong somebody. It doesn't feel good to be called a rapist and murderer."
…
The district attorney who prosecuted both defendants, Forrest Allgood, disputed any suggestion that his office knowingly sent the wrong men to prison.
"It torments the innocent individual, undermines the public confidence in the justice system, and the bad guy is still running loose," he said. "Why people would believe that's something we would want to do is beyond me."
Allgood said he has not used West as a forensic expert since the mid-1990s. He said West was once considered one of the world's foremost authorities in his field, lecturing in China and England.
"Subsequently the whole situation turned into a train wreck," the district attorney said.
Read the full story here. (Associated Press, 02/29/08)
Read more about calls for reform in the wake of the Brewer and Brooks cases here.
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
Mississippi officials agree that state reforms are badly needed
Posted: March 3, 2008 3:11 pm
Innocence Project clients Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer were freed last month after DNA proved that they were convicted of murders they didn’t commit. Their cases have sparked a thorough review of forensic testing in Mississippi, and lawmakers this week are calling for significant changes to ensure that more innocent people are not convicted in the state.
State Attorney General Jim Hood said a key way to prevent wrongful convictions is to upgrade how Mississippi processes DNA evidence.
“Some of it may cost money, but it keeps innocent people from going to the penitentiary, and we will put a whole lot more people in the pen that have committed crimes if we had a DNA lab that tested every sample that we pulled,” Hood said.Read more recent coverage of reforms in Mississippi.
“These cases are an urgent call for a thorough review of how crime-scene evidence gets analyzed and makes it into Mississippi courtrooms and how we can make sure only the most credible, objective, reliable science is used in criminal cases,” (Innocence Project Co-Director Peter) Neufeld said in a statement issued by the Innocence Project.Hood agreed such improvements are needed - with upgrading the state crime lab and state coroner's office being the most important steps to take.
“As far as a review of our criminal justice system, there's always room for error with humans. And there's always room for re-evaluations of how we do it. But there are nut-and-bolts things...like fully funding our crime lab and medical examiner's office,” he said.
Read the full article here. (Commercial Dispatch, 03/01/08)
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
How much is Steven Hayne using state labs for his botched autopsies?
Posted: March 5, 2008 1:46 pm
The Innocence Project today sent formal requests to nearly two dozen Mississippi officials, requesting documents that will show how much Medical Examiner Steven Hayne has been using state labs for autopsies that are clearly erroneous.
Hayne’s forensic misconduct has come to light in recent weeks, following court hearings last month where two Innocence Project clients – Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks – were cleared after serving 15 years for murders they didn’t commit. Hayne’s faulty work contributed to both men’s convictions.
Read today’s Innocence Project press release on the new developments, and download the full content of the letter.
Learn more about the cases of Brewer and Brooks here.
Also today, a column in the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal calls on Mississippi officials to reform forensic and legal practices to ensure that the innocent aren’t convicted of crimes they didn’t commit.
Aside from ending the personal injustices endured by Arthur Johnson, Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer, The Innocence Project is also showing the state how it can do better.
For instance, the Legislature could add Mississippi to the 42 states that already provide post-conviction DNA testing where there's a claim of innocence.
Mississippi could modernize the Crime Lab, which is seeking a total of $9 million this year out of the state's nearly $6 billion general fund budget.
Mississippi could hire a medical examiner, who would be the first since the last one left in 1995.
Mississippi could expedite post-conviction hearings when new or additional evidence tends to show a jury has been misled, even if the evidence against a person was offered in good faith.
Read the full column here. (Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal, 03/05/08)
Read Radley Balko’s post on the Reason Magazine blog about today’s Innocence Project document requests.
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
Leading Mississippi Newspaper Supports Investigation of Steven Hayne
Posted: March 10, 2008 4:50 pm
The Hattiesburg American published an editorial Sunday in support of the Innocence Project’s efforts to investigate misconduct by Mississippi pathologist Steven Hayne. The Innocence Project has called upon Mississippi state authorities to comply with Public Records Act requests for information on Hayne, who contributed to the wrongful convictions of Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks.
Even if it means that all of the cases that Hayne and West worked on come under review, the investigation should advance. Even if it costs thousands of dollars and thousands of hours, it will be worth it if even one person wrongly convicted is freed or wins a new trial.The Innocence Project has sent letters to the state crime lab director and 22 district attorneys around the state in an effort to uncover information that might lead to additional evidence of wrongful convictions. Hayne conducts 80% of all criminal autopsies in the state and is not properly board-certified. The Innocence Project has also urged the Mississippi Department of Public Safety to fill the State Medical Examiner position that has been vacant for over a decade and provides critical oversight on the work of medical examiners in the state.
Read the full editorial here. (Hattiesburg American, 03/09/08)
Read the Innocence Project press release here.
Read more about Brewer and Brooks cases here.
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
Hearing Thursday in Mississippi for Levon Brooks
Posted: March 11, 2008 4:28 pm
District Attorney Forrest Allgood, of Noxubee County, Mississippi, has announced that he intends to drop the capital murder indictment against Innocence Project client Levon Brooks at a hearing Thursday morning in Macon, Mississippi.
Brooks spent 15 years in prison for the rape and murder of his girlfriend’s three-year-old daughter – a crime he did not commit. He was wrongfully convicted with the flawed forensic analysis of medical examiner Steven Hayne and bite mark analyst Michael West. Hayne and West also helped secure the wrongful conviction of Innocence Project client Kennedy Brewer, who was exonerated in February after 15 years behind bars. DNA evidence in the Brewer case led to the identification of the real perpetrator, Justin Albert Johnson, who confessed to both the Brewer and Brooks crimes.
Innocence Project Co-Director Peter Neufeld and Staff Attorney Vanessa Potkin will represent Brooks at Thursday’s hearing.
Read today’s Jackson Clarion Ledger article here.
Read more about Brooks and Brewer’s cases here.
Read about calls for reform to the Mississippi criminal justice system here.
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
Levon Brooks is exonerated in Mississippi
Posted: March 13, 2008 2:05 pm
At a hearing this morning in Macon, Mississippi, Innocence Project client Levon Brooks was fully cleared of charges relating to a 1990 murder for which he was wrongfully incarcerated for 15 years. Brooks was convicted of the murder based on the faulty forensic testimony of Dr. Steven Hayne and Michael West, and sentenced to life in prison. The same forensic experts also testified at the trial of Innocence Project client Kennedy Brewer, who was exonerated last month after serving 15 years (several of them on death row) for an eerily similar murder in the same town as the murder for which Brooks was convicted.
DNA testing and other evidence now shows that both murders were committed by the same man, Justin Albert Johnson, who has admitted that he killed both child victims alone. At a hearing last month, Brewer was fully exonerated and Brooks was released, but charges remained against Brooks until today.
Read more about Brooks’ case and the Innocence Project’s ongoing efforts to reform forensic science practices in Mississippi.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
How many innocent people have been sent to prison by faulty science in Mississippi?
Posted: March 17, 2008 4:45 pm
After the exoneration of two Innocence Project clients in Mississippi in the last month, the Innocence Project and other advocates have called for a thorough review of forensic science practices in the state. An editorial in today’s Clarion-Ledger calls for a modernized crime lab, a state medical examiner to oversee criminal autopsies and more.
Read the full editorial here. (Clarion-Ledger, 03/16/08)
The Innocence Project currently represents seven more clients seeking post-conviction DNA testing in Mississippi, and our intake team is evaluating an additional 111 cases. We have received more than 50 applications for assistance each year for the last three years.
The Innocence Project accepts cases in which DNA evidence could possibly prove innocence, and only about 10 percent of all criminal cases involve biological evidence that can be subjected to DNA testing. The Mississippi Innocence Project and Innocence Project New Orleans both work on post-conviction appeals cases in Mississippi, including both DNA and non-DNA cases. Mississippi Innocence Project Director Tucker Carrington said this week that about three dozen cases involving Steven Hayne, the notorious medical examiner who testified in both the Brewer and Brooks cases, were in need of review.
Read more here. (Clarion-Ledger, 03/16/08)
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Put an end to Mississippi autopsy misconduct
Posted: April 8, 2008 3:50 pm
The Innocence Project and the Mississippi Innocence Project today formally asked officials to revoke the medical license of Dr. Steven Hayne, whose fraud and misconduct has led to an unknown number of wrongful convictions. Evidence uncovered by the Innocence Project shows that Hayne has repeatedly broken Mississippi laws governing medical practice. He claims to conduct more than 80% of Mississippi’s criminal autopsies, and his practices have come under serious scrutiny this year after two men – Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks – were exonerated, 15 years after Hayne’s testimony helped convict them of capital crimes they did not commit.
Read today’s Innocence Project press release on the allegation requesting that Hayne’s license be revoked and download the full content of the summary letter sent to Mississippi officials.
Learn more about the Brewer and Brooks cases.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
With his license on the line, Mississippi doctor responds
Posted: April 9, 2008 3:25 pm
After the Innocence Project filed a formal complaint yesterday to revoke Steven Hayne’s Mississippi medical license due to his autopsy misconduct, the doctor broke his long silence to the media and tried to defend his record.
(Innocence Project) officials say Hayne performs too many autopsies each year – about 1,500.
The National Association of Medical Examiners limits pathologists to fewer than 250 autopsies a year.In the article, Hayne does not cite organizations that say it’s acceptable to do 350 autopsies a year, or organizations that recommend no limit at all – likely because no credible organization or expert would say it’s acceptable to do so many autopsies, let alone 1,500 per year. In the complaint filed yesterday, the Innocence Project also notes that Hayne claims to testify in more than 300 cases a year while also serving as the Medical Director of three different medical institutions. The volume of work is important, since the quality of Hayne’s work is so poor, as evidenced by numerous cases (several of which are cited in the complaint filed yesterday).
Hayne said such a number is arbitrary. “There’s one group that says you shouldn’t do more than 350, and there are other groups that don’t have a limit,” he said. “Should I call the Innocence Project to see if I’ve done too many and stop?”
He estimates he works 110 hours a week. “Some people were put on this earth to party, and some people were put on this earth to work,” he said. “I’ve always worked very hard.”
Hayne’s questionable practices have come to light after the exonerations of two Innocence Project clients – Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer – 15 years after Hayne’s testimony helped convict them of capital crimes they didn’t commit. Forrest Allgood, the prosecutor in both the Brewer and Brooks cases, comes to Hayne’s defense in today’s article.
"My experience with Hayne is that 99 times out of 100 he testifies this guy died and this is how he died," Allgood said. "How is that in any way convicting innocent people?"
Read the full article here. (Mississippi Clarion-Ledger, 04/09/08)
In the Brewer and Brooks cases, Hayne’s testimony substantiated Allgood’s central argument: that the defendants bit the victims before killing them. But the complaint filed yesterday says Hayne testified falsely to support Allgood’s prosecution case. Marks on the victims were not human bites, and they occurred after the victims died and their bodies were dumped in the water. There was no scientific basis for Hayne’s testimony, but the testimony was critical in helping Allgood wrongfully convict Brewer and Brooks in separate trials. As a result, Brewer was sentenced to die, and Brooks was sentenced to life without parole.
Read more coverage of yesterday’s request by the Innocence Project and the Mississippi Innocence Project that officials revoke Hayne’s license:
Associated Press: Attorneys ask state board to pull pathologist’s license
Read the Innocence Project’s April 8 letter to Mississippi officials.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Oversight on the horizon in Mississippi?
Posted: April 14, 2008 2:25 pm
The news on forensic science in Mississippi hasn’t been good in recent months. The exonerations of two Innocence Project clients – Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks – revealed false testimony and misconduct by medical examiner Steven Hayne and forensic dentist Michael West. The cases highlight the need for forensic oversight – and the consequences of not having a Mississippi State Medical Examiner, a position the legislature created to ensure standards in autopsies. The position has been vacant for more than a decade. During that time, Hayne says he has performed tens of thousands of autopsies. He may be using federally funded state labs for some of these autopsies. He has violated state laws governing medical practice during that time.
But there is some good news today. After repeated calls for improved forensic oversight from the Innocence Project, the Mississippi Innocence Project, members of the public and several newspapers, Gov. Haley Barbour has nominated a new commissioner for the Mississippi Department of Public Safety. The nominee – Circuit Judge Stephen Sampson – says his first priorities will be improving the state crime lab and naming a chief medical examiner to fill the long vacant position.
Read about Sampson’s nomination here. (Clarion-Ledger, 04/12/08)
Last week, the Innocence Project filed a formal request for Hayne’s medical license to be revoked. And a story published Sunday on Reason Magazine’s Hit-and-Run blog details another possible wrongful conviction in which Hayne made errors and oversights called “egregious” by fellow doctors.
This morning, Mississippi Innocence Project Director Tucker Carrington was interviewed on Mississippi Public Broadcasting. Listen to the interview here.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
More misconduct in Mississippi: Pathologist lied about his credentials
Posted: April 28, 2008 1:05 pm
Mississippi medical examiner Steven Hayne has sworn under oath repeatedly in recent years that he is certified by the American Board of Forensic Pathology. But the board, which was never recognized by the National Association of Medical Examiners, ceased to exist in 1995. Innocence Project Co-Director Peter Neufeld pointed out this weekend that this is several of many instances in which Hayne’s testimony under oath has misrepresented the facts.
"This shows Hayne has misrepresented his credentials under oath," said Peter Neufeld, co-director of the New York-based Innocence Project, which has called for Hayne to be stripped of his medical license.Hayne, who says he works 110 hours a week and conducts 1,500 autopsies a year, gave incorrect and misleading testimony at the trials of Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer, both Innocence Project clients who were exonerated this year after serving a combined three decades in prison for murders they didn’t commit. Brewer spent much of his time on death row.
Lawyers and inmates in Mississippi have begun to envision major legal repercussions as Hayne’s questionable practices come to light.
Hinds County Assistant Public Defender Matthew Eichelberger has questioned Hayne under oath about his credentials.
"We as a state need to brace ourselves for a tidal wave of innocence claims as a result of what's been uncovered regarding Steven Hayne," he said. "And the scariest part of all of this isn't the thousands of hours of extra work we in the legal community will have to face. It's the stark realization that there are innocent people behind bars, some of whom have been there a very long time."Read the Innocence Project’s recent letter calling for Hayne’s license to be revoked.
Read the full story here. (Jackson Clarion-Ledger, 04/27/08)
Read Reason Magazine’s investigation of Mississippi forensics – “CSI Mississippi”
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
New pressure on Mississippi medical examiner
Posted: May 7, 2008 3:12 pm
For months, Mississippi medical examiner Steven Hayne has come under fire for years of false forensic testimony, unethical methods, nepotism and potential illegal activities. His flawed autopsies led two innocent men to spend a combined three decades in prison before they were exonerated earlier this year. He claims to work 110 hours a week and conduct 1,500 autopsies a year – earning him more than a million dollars annually.
The Innocence Project has formally asked for his medical license to be revoked, and this week the Hattiesburg American asked why Mississippi district attorneys are still supporting – and hiring—Hayne. Three DA’s told the newspaper that they had no problem with Hayne’s work. An editorial criticized these comments as ignorant:
This strikes as three ostriches putting their heads in the sand. How can these DA's be at all confident in Hayne's work given the information that has come out about the pathologist?
The DA's have been asked by the Innocence Project to turn over any documents pertaining to Hayne, including official reports on autopsies.Read more about Hayne’s activities and the exonerations of Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks.
We hope they are complying. They must, if they believe in justice.
Meanwhile, the Legislature has funded $500,000 this year for a state medical examiner. The state has been without one since 1994 and if more of Hayne's work is found to be faulty, the state will have no one but itself to blame.
Read the full editorial here. (Hattiesburg American, 05/04/08)
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
Why Mississippi needs a new medical examiner
Posted: June 16, 2008 5:05 pm
For 13 years, Mississippi hasn’t had a state medical examiner to oversee autopsies, and a discredited pathologist is still conducting more than 1,500 autopsies a year – more than 80 percent of those conducted in the entire state. Steven Hayne’s fraudulent testimony led to the wrongful convictions of Innocence Project clients Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks in the early 1980s, and he has testified in hundreds of cases since. Brewer and Brooks, both Innocence Project clients, were exonerated earlier this year after DNA testing proved that Hayne testified falsely in their trials. The Mississippi Innocence Project is conducting a review of at least 70 cases in which Hayne’s testimony could have caused a wrongful conviction.
A leading Mississippi doctor said recently that the state’s medical investigations are in a “state of rigor mortis” and called for the immediate hiring of a state M.E.
"It is unthinkable that Mississippi has regressed in the medico-legal investigation of death into a veritable state of rigor mortis during the past 13 years," (said Dr. Dwalia South, the immediate past president of the Mississippi State Medical Association "We live in a world that now expects CSI efficiency, and we are giving them the wild West and Gunsmoke. For most of the past 34 years, no one has bothered to ponder its flaws until things have been grossly and irreparably botched."Earlier this year, Mississippi lawmakers allocated funds to the vacant medical examiner’s office, and a new Public Safety Commissioner said hiring a state M.E. was a high priority. No one has been appointed yet. The Innocence Project has led calls for a new state medical examiner, and we have also formally requested that Hayne be stripped of his medical license. Read more about our efforts in Mississippi here.
Read the full story here. (Jackson Clarion-Ledger, 06/16/08)
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Friday roundup
Posted: July 11, 2008 4:18 pm
There’s so much news each week on wrongful convictions and forensic science that we can’t cover it all. Here’s a roundup of news you might have missed:
The ripples are still being felt from the Brewer and Brooks exonerations in Mississippi. An editorial in today’s Hattiesburg American says a new task force in Mississippi “has a lot on its plate” in a state without standards for evidence collection and testing. On Monday, an editorial in the Jackson Clarion-Ledger said “the inadequacy of Mississippi's ‘CSI’ would make a sad, and scary, episode if it were presented on television.”
Earlier this year, Innocence Project clients Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks were exonerated after serving 15 years in prison for nearly identical child murders they didn’t commit. Brewer was on death row for most of those 15 years and he could have been executed. But DNA testing in Brewer’s case proved his innocence and pointed to the real perpetrator, who confessed to committing the crime for which Brooks was serving as well.
Stories about crime labs were clogging the news this week, while evidence backlogs were clogging the labs. A report from the Urban Institute found that DNA has become more effective than fingerprints and witnesses in solving burglaries and other property crimes. The problem is that if this expanded use of DNA testing becomes the national norm, our crime labs will be overwhelmed. Arkansas has increased funding for its state lab to cut the backlog from 15,000 cases to 2,500 cases. And an Omaha crime lab is tightening security after alleged mishandling set off a scandal.
We keep hearing at the Innocence Project about students and teachers using the resources from our “947 Years” website to build lesson plans and class presentations about wrongful convictions and forensic science. But as DNA testing becomes more prevalent in criminal cases, who is teaching our nation’s judges about advances in forensic science? The answer: UNC professor James P. Evans. Find out what he’s telling judges across the country and why he says judges are afraid of science.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer, Crime Lab Backlogs
Building momentum quickly: the Mississippi Innocence Project
Posted: July 23, 2008 10:05 am
The Mississippi Innocence Project was established last year at the University of Mississippi School of Law, and has already contributed to two major exonerations in the state -- those of Innocence Project clients Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer. Innocence Project Co-Director Peter Neufeld said this week that working with local partners like the MIP is a key element of successful exonerations.
"The truth is, you can only do so much from 1,000 miles away," Neufeld explained. "It really takes people on the ground in each state to make a difference. It's really remarkable that in such a short time, the Mississippi Innocence Project got itself started, got students interested, got the backing of the university and other lawyers in the state, and, within a very, very brief time, pulled off a very important exoneration here in the state."The Mississippi Innocence Project also received a $75,000 grant this week from the state bar association to help with case review. Read more.
The Mississippi project was created with funding from (author John) Grisham and attorney Wilbur Colom of Columbus. In fall 2007, Grisham joined fellow author Scott Turow at a dinner to raise operating funds for the state organization.
"There has been very little innocence activity in Mississippi," Grisham said. "Our state has a high rate of wrongful convictions, literally hundreds of innocent prisoners behind bars. These people are serving time for crimes committed by others, and in many cases the real criminals are still breaking the law.
Read the full story here.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
The week in review
Posted: August 15, 2008 11:07 am
It was a big week for reform. Follow the links below for stories this week on measures, meetings and commentary around the country aimed at preventing future injustice. Meanwhile, prosecutors in Florida and Alabama spoke out against defendants seeking to prove their innocence, and a Mississippi man got a trial date for murders that sent two innocent men to prison for 15 years each.
In Texas today, the Innocence Project is calling on the state Forensic Science Commission to investigate the case of Cameron Todd Willingham, who was executed for three murders he said he didn’t commit, and Ernest Willis, who was convicted on the same faulty arson science as Willingham and later freed. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals also held the first meeting of its new Criminal Justice Integrity Unit. The blog Grits for Breakfast reports on the meeting here.
Prosecutors and law enforcement officers were in a “tug-of-war” this week over control of a new crime lab in Orange County, California. A DNA exoneration in Orange County highlighted the need for independent crime labs, after the prosecutor unsuccessfully pressed forensic analysts to alter their reports on testing that exonerated a wrongfully convicted man.
The New York Times’ Adam Liptak questioned why expert testimony in criminal trials must come from the opposing sides of the courtroom – a practice fairly unique in the world. Two op-eds argued that funding for defense experts would level the playing field for defendants.
Evidence preservation continued to garner headlines this week, a Reno column today says “the cause of justice must be upheld and preserved. And this means preservation of physical evidence.”
Canada’s highest court affirmed the exoneration of an Ontario man and pointed to the “frailties of eyewitness identification.”
Defendants and prosecutors in Alabama and Florida continued to stand at odds this week. William Dillon’s lawyers in Florida said prosecutors were delaying meetings to keep their innocent client in prison, and the prosecutor responded by saying “File your damn motions and stop being a cry baby.” The Attorney General of Alabama called on the State Supreme Court of lift its stay of Tommy Arthur’s execution, saying the stay was “wrong as a matter of law and fact.” The Innocence Project has consulted with Arthur’s attorneys on the case, and Innocence Project supporters continued this week to send emails to Alabama Gov. Bob Riley urging him to order DNA testing in Arthur’s case.
Justin Albert Johnson is set for trial in Mississippi on September 8 for the murders of two three-year-old girls in the early 1990s. Innocence Project clients Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks each spent 15 years in prison for these murders – Brewer was on death row – before they were exonerated earlier this year.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer
Ousted Mississippi medical examiner's alarming backlog deepens concerns about his work
Posted: August 21, 2008 2:45 pm
Steven Hayne, who was recently removed from Mississippi’s list of approved pathologists, has 90 days to turn in reports on his backlog of cases. Public Safety Commissioner Steve Simpson announced the decision to remove Hayne from the state’s list on August 5, amid increased public scrutiny of Hayne’s work in the aftermath of the exonerations of Innocence Project clients Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks earlier this year.
When the state announced that it is severing ties with Hayne, Simpson said Hayne had “400 to 500” autopsy reports to complete within 90 days of the announcement. From the Jackson Clarion-Ledger the day after the state announced Hayne’s contract was being terminated:
Asked why Hayne's name alone was removed from the list, Simpson replied, "Because they don't owe me 400 or 500 reports."But information in today’s Clarion Ledger suggests that claim was false -- and raises troubling new questions. Rather than 400-500 outstanding autopsy reports, Hayne’s lawyer now says there are 600. To put that number – which accounts for just the outstanding autopsy reports that Hayne has not completed – in context, mainstream professional associations say that a pathologist should not conduct more than 250 autopsies a year. Hayne has claimed to conduct 1,500 to 1,800 autopsies a year, a volume that could help explain why he apparently struggles to complete the critical autopsy reports in a timely fashion.
Simpson said he wants Hayne to wrap up the outstanding autopsies within 90 days, when Hayne's contract with the state expires.
Hayne's attorney, Dale Danks Jr. of Jackson, said the only reason up to 500 of Hayne's reports are pending is that Hayne is awaiting toxicology reports from the state Crime Lab in the cases.
Read the full article here.
Today’s Clarion Ledger also makes it clear that the state crime lab is not the reason so many of Hayne’s autopsy reports are incomplete. In fact, fewer than 15% of Hayne’s outstanding autopsy reports are awaiting toxicology reports from the state crime lab. From today’s Clarion Ledger:
On Wednesday, Danks said Hayne planned to turn in the 600 reports by the end of next week, regardless of whether toxicology reports have been completed or not.Danks does not explain why 500 or more cases (for which Hayne is not waiting for toxicology reports) are still pending – or for how long those autopsy reports have remained incomplete.
About 150 of them lack toxicology reports, Danks said. "He got one toxicology report in yesterday that was three years old. Apparently the Crime Lab sent it out of state."
Sam Howell, director of the state Crime Lab, said according to his records, there are only about 100 toxicology reports outstanding at this time.
"I don't know how many of those 100 cases are Dr. Hayne's," Howell said. "They could be coroner cases that have nothing to do with autopsies."
More than half that number are less than 30 days old, he said.
Read the full article here.
The Innocence Project investigated how Hayne’s shoddy work contributed to the wrongful convictions of Brewer and Brooks and is now calling for a comprehensive list of all cases Hayne has handled and records relating to those cases. The Innocence Project and the Mississippi Innocence Project have challenged Hayne’s work for months, calling on the state to fill the long-vacant State Medical Examiner position and also filing a formal allegation with the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure to revoke Hayne’s license to practice medicine. The Innocence Project is currently reviewing hundreds of cases in which Hayne testified.
Read Innocence Project press release on Hayne’s termination – and the need for the state to compel him to turn over a list of all cases he has worked on, along with autopsy reports for each of those cases -- here.
Read more on the Brooks and Brewer cases here.
Read the summary letter of the Innocence Project’s pending complaint with the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure here.
Read more about Hayne in Reason Magazine Senior Editor Radley Balko’s groundbreaking investigative report, “CSI: Mississippi,” here.
August 5 Mississippi medical examiner press conference [audio: 17:25]
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
More revelations in Mississippi
Posted: September 8, 2008 2:17 pm
Last month, Mississippi officials cut ties with medical examiner Steven Hayne, whose forensic misconduct led to at least two wrongful convictions that have been overturned. In a post on the Reason Magazine blog yesterday, Radley Balko discusses a trove of documents showing that state officials knew about problems with Hayne’s work as long as 15 years ago, but did nothing about it.
Balko says he will roll out significant documents from this dossier over the coming days on the Reason blog. Stay tuned.
Read more about the cases of Innocence Project clients Kennedy Brewer and Levon Brooks, and the misconduct of Steven Hayne.
Tags: Mississippi, Kennedy Brewer
Former Mississippi Justice Rethinks Death Penalty
Posted: June 17, 2009 5:08 pm
Looking back over his record on Mississippi’s Supreme Court, former Justice Oliver Diaz says he has some regrets. His first vote, for example, was “to kill an innocent man.”
He was voting against overturning the death sentence of Kennedy Brewer, who was exonerated last year when DNA testing obtained by the Innocence Project proved his innocence of a 1992 murder.
“Reflecting on my votes at the Supreme Court, I realized that there is just so much error involved in these cases that it's not worth carrying out the death penalty,” Diaz told WAPT in Jackson. “We have innocent people in Mississippi who have been sitting on death row for years.”Read more about Brewer’s case here.
Read the full story and watch a video interview with Diaz. (WAPT, 6/17/09)
Read the Innocence Project's policy on the death penalty and learn about the 17 people exonerated after serving time on death row for crimes they didn’t commit.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer, Death Penalty
Forensics Series Continues Tonight on CNN
Posted: August 20, 2009 3:15 pm
CNN’s “Anderson Cooper 360” has been investigating questions about forensic disciplines in a special series on forensics this week. Last night, CNN contributor Sanjay Gupta visited the Georgia Bureau of Investigation crime lab to report on hair analysis, bullet analysis and DNA testing practices. Watch video of his visit here.
And CNN medical producer Stephanie Smith posted on the AC360 blog today about Innocence Project client Steven Barnes and the role of unvalidated forensics in wrongful convictions.
The show continues tonight at 10 p.m. ET with a report on Dr. Steven Hayne in Mississippi, who has been accused of reaching conclusions that go beyond science to fit what prosecutors need to secure convictions. Tonight's broadcast will feature an interview with Tyler Edmonds, who was sentenced to death row partly as a result of Hayne's testimony. Edmonds was released after the Mississippi Supreme Court threw out his conviction -- in a ruling that called Hayne's testimony "scientifically unfounded."
Two Innocence Project clients were exonerated last year after Hayne's testimony contributed to their wrongful convictions; read more about their cases here.
Learn about recommendations for forensic reform and take action at the Just Science website.
Tags: Steven Barnes, Kennedy Brewer, Forensic Oversight, Unvalidated/Improper Forensics
Faulty Science and the Wrong Man on Death Row
Posted: February 18, 2010 6:47 am
In 1995, Kennedy Brewer was sentenced to death in Mississippi for allegedly raping and murdering his girlfriend's three-year old daughter. Although his conviction was overturned in 2001 after seven years on death row, he would spend another five years in jail, and two years free on bond, before he was finally exonerated two years ago this week.
Pictured, from left to right, are Innocence Project Staff Attorney Vanessa Potkin, Brewer, Mississippi exoneree Levon Brooks and Innocence Project Co-Director Peter Neufeld.
Dr. Michael West, a bite-mark analyst who has since been discredited, provided critical testimony for the prosecution. West was brought into the case by Dr. Steven Hayne, a medical examiner who lacks proper board certification and whose work has also been discredited. At trial, West told the jury that Brewer had bitten the girl 19 times using only his upper two teeth, and that marks on the victim's body conclusively matched Brewer's dental records. In fact, experts say that the marks weren't even caused by human teeth.
West's procedures and findings have come under fire in numerous cases. He claims to have invented the "West Phenomenon," in which he donned yellow goggles, and, using a blue laser, identified bite marks, scratches and other marks that only he could see. West also claimed to have conclusively identified a perpetrator from bite marks on a bologna sandwich. That conviction was later overturned. In 2001, a defense lawyer sent his own dental mold and photographs of bite marks on a victim's breast to West, along with his $750 retainer. West produced a video for the lawyer in which he concluded that the mold and photos were a definite match.
In its 2009 report on forensic science, The National Academy of Sciences criticized the relatively new field of forensic odontology, because there is no widely accepted way to measure the reliability of bite marks, no national database to compare samples and a lack of extensive peer review and research. To remedy these problems, the NAS recommended the formation of a national entity to supervise and support forensic science, including bite mark analysis. Learn more about improper and unvalidated forensic science and read the full NAS report here.
Citing West's original testimony, the Mississippi State Supreme Court affirmed Brewer's conviction and death sentence in 1997. DNA testing performed in 2001 showed that he could not have committed the crime and led to his conviction being overturned. Prosecutors, however, said they intended to retry him.
Brewer remained in jail awaiting the promised trial until 2007, when he was freed on bond -- with a trial still pending. The next year, an Innocence Project investigation led to further DNA testing, which implicated another man as the perpetrator. The real perpetrator then confessed to committing the crime, and a similar crime for which another man — Levon Brooks — had been wrongfully convicted as well.
Brewer says he's not angry about the injustice he suffered and instead wants to focus on moving on with his life. He met his future wife in a program after his exoneration, and plans to get married this April. Brewer also has two children and a grandson. He currently works at a food processing plant in Brooksville, Mississippi.
Tags: Kennedy Brewer